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Be Creative!

In order for you to accomplish the impossible – you must be willing to embrace the unpopular.

I love to carefully study the lives of people who have been successful in what they set out to do and become. Each time I see someone who has gone above and beyond the norm – I have noticed one characteristic rise to the top: the willingness to flow against the current of conventional thinking. There are two instances among many in the life of our Savior that stand out as proof that Jesus was willing to go against conventional thinking to accomplish His mission.

• Consider this in the sickness of Lazarus, the good friend of Jesus –

John 11:6
When he had heard therefore that he was sick, he abode two days still in the same place where he was.

Conventional thinking would say – drop what you are doing and make your way to heal your good friend. They need you right now, so why are you waiting! But Jesus saw the big picture and realized God would receive more glory by allowing Lazarus to die than for there to be an instantaneous healing.

• Consider the reaction of the disciples when people didn’t agree with them –

Luke 9:53-54
And they did not receive him, because his face was as though he would go to Jerusalem. And when his disciples James and John saw [this], they said, Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did?

Conventional thinking says “If someone doesn’t agree with me – forget them!” Again, the Lord saw beyond the short-mindedness of both His disciples as well as those who didn’t receive Him and saw the greater purpose for which He had come.

There are some of you facing a dilemma as to the direction of your life. There may be opportunities that lie ahead of you about which you are unclear what to do. It may be a career change, a physical move, or simply taking the next step in your journey of personal and spiritual growth. Here is my encouragement to you: Don’t rely on conventional thinking but be willing to allow the Holy Spirit to inspire you with creative and “out of the box” thinking. Let me give you a couple of thoughts:

• Don’t confine yourself to the obvious
• Allow your mind and spirit to be stretched to consider possibilities that on the surface may seem unlikely – but just maybe the Lord is leading you to do the unlikely.
• Don’t fear failure
• Creative thinking demands the ability to be unafraid of failure. Failure is not your enemy – it is your friend because many of life’s greatest achievements have come through those willing to get up from falling and try again.
• Don’t let others determine your direction
• Even if what you feel in your heart sounds foolish – don’t let someone else talk you out of it. You cannot do something new and exciting by staying put in the same old rut. As Edward De Bono observed “You cannot dig a hole in a different place by digging the same hole deeper.”

Allow your thinking to be released by the Spirit into realms thought humanly impossible. It is time for the desires God has placed within you to come to fruition. That simply starts by thinking creatively. Whatever the dream or desire – go after with passion and see God fulfill it!